Drive means for planetary napping device



Dec. 10, 1968 J TOMLINSON 3,414,953

DRIVE MEANS FOR PLANETARY NAPPING DEVICE Filed April 6, 1965 2Sheets-Sheet l a a.- 2%? w W M 4 my! QJ 9| J m Eg 7 I \L' "MIMI I r11.:2 L

1 INVENTOR. n JOHN M 0. mill/MW ITIOIPIVEKS' Dec. 10, 1968 J. M. D.TOMLINSON 3,414,953

DRIVE MEANS FOR PLANETARY NAPPING DEVICE 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed April 6,1965 l zL M/M United States Patent 3,414,953 DRIVE MEANS FOR PLANETARYNAPPING DEVICE John M. D. Tomlinson, Bamford, Rochdale, England, as-

signor to Tomlinsons (Rochdale) Limited, a corporation of Great Britain,Northern Ireland and the Isle of Man Filed Apr. 6, 1965, Ser. No.445,947 Claims priority, application Great Britain, Apr. 9, 1964,14,623/ 64 8 Claims. (Cl. 26-35) ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE Cardclothing covered rollers of a planetary napper are engaged by a gearwheel which is rotated by a driving element via a magnetic coupling. Atleast two variable transformers alternatively control torquecharacteristics of coupling, one transformer being adjusted to yield azero raise condition, and the other to cause raising or felting. If pileand counterpile rollers are used, a separate driving element, magneticcoupling, and variable are transformers employed for each roller set.Means are also provided for measuring torque variation to indicate theamount of the raising or felting force.

This invention concerns wire card raising machines of both the singleacting and the double acting type.

A wire card raising machine of the single acting type comprises acylinder made up from a plurality of longitudinally mounted rotatablerollers covered with card clothing. In this type of raising machine thecard clothing is attached to the roller-s in such a manner that thewires all point in the same direction.

A double acting raising machine is of basically the same construction asthat described above with the exception that alternate rollers formingone set have their card clothing attached in such a manner that thewires point in one direction while the wires of the intermediate rollersforming another set point in the opposite direction.

Generally the rollers of one set are known as pile rollers and therollers of the other set are known as counterpile rollers.

Generally the pile rollers have the wires of the card clothing pointingin the direct-ion in which cloth travels over the cylinder and thecounterpile rollers have the wires pointing in the opposite direction tothat in which the cloth travels.

A typical cylinder construction includes a pair of discs which carrybearings for the ends of the rollers and adjacent and outside thesediscs relative to the rollers are mounted a pair of gear wheels. Thecylinder and the gear wheels rotate about a common axis. The rollers maybe driven by means of belts, chains, gears or other driving means fromthe gear wheels mentioned above.

The cylinder as a whole is driven in one direction and the rollers aredriven, via the gear wheels, in either the same or the oppositedirection. The speed of rotation of the cylinder is normally constantbut the speed of each set of rollers is usually independently variable.

When raising takes place by both the pile and counterpile rollers theseare driven in such a way that the card wire points move at a speed otherthan the speed at which a web of textile material, herein referred to ascloth, is fed over the cylinder. The purpose of so arranging the speeddifferential is to cause the points of the wires of both the pile andcounterpile rollers to enter the cloth to pluck at the weft ortransversely disposed threads or parts thereof and, to a lesser extentthe warp or longi- 3,414,953 Patented Dec. 10, 1968 tudinally disposedthreads or parts thereof to achieve raising action.

It is found that three conditions can apply to both the pile andcounterpile rollers and for the sake of convenience these threeconditions will be considered with the cloth stationary.

Considering the pile rollers first the conditions are:

(a) If there is no drive applied to the pile rollers (ie the drive isdisconnected) the pile rollers will rotate it a direction opposite tothe direction of rotation of the cylinder and a such a speed that due tocontact with the cloth, if the machine were truly friction-less thewires 01 the rollers would merely tend to enter and leave the clotf andneither tend to cause a raising effect nor to skid on the cloth. Thewires, therefore, have no action and the sc called true practical zeroraising conditions are attained. The same conditions will prevail ifcorrect speed adjustment is achieved when the cloth is moving.

(b) If the rollers are now driven so that they are caused to rotateslightly more slowly than in (a) above then the points of the wires arecarried forward by the cylinder and they dig into the cloth to giveraising action. Thus to obtain raising action it is necessary to applybraking action to the pile rollers.

(c) If the rollers are now driven at a speed in excess of (a) and nobraking action is applied then the wires merely skid or 'brush the clothwith the back of the card points and there would be, with the clothstationary 01 moving, a tendency for the cloth to try to slow therollers down. Although there is no raising action applied under thesecircumstances this is not considered to be the true practical zeroraising condition in this specification and for the sake ofdifferentiation between conditions (a) and (c) the latter condition willbe referred to as negative raise.

For the sake of completeness it will be mentioned that if the pilerollers are caused to move very slowly or are stopped completely thenthe wires would embed themselves deeply into the cloth and a viciousraising action or tearing thereof would result.

The conditions at the counter-pile rollers are somewhat different andare as follows:

(-i) If the counter-pile rollers are driven at a peripheral speed equalto the peripheral speed of the cylinder and in the opposite sense thewire points may either tend to enter and leave the cloth or merelycontact the cloth and neither tend to cause a raising effect nor to skidon the cloth. It follows, therefore, that it is also possible to obtaintrue practical zero raise conditions in the case of these rollers.

(ii) If the counterpile rollers are driven at a speed slightly in excessof that referred to in (i) above the wires tend to dig into the cloth to,give raising action.

(iii) If the counter-pile rollers are rotated more slowly than in (i)above-or are stopped-the wires merely skid on or brush the cloth withthe back of the points. This is not the true practical zero raisecondition and for the sake of differentiation between this condition andthe condition set out at (i) above it will be referred to as negativeraise.

For the sake of completeness it is pointed out that if the speed of thecounter-pile rollers is increased by a large amount above the speedmentioned in (i) above the points embed themselves deeply into the clothand vicious raising or tearing thereof occurs.

When changing from negative raise, through practical zero, to positiveraise, the forces acting on the rollers change, in that in condition (c)the rollers are being wholly driven by the external drive but as theyare slowed down i.e., to pass through condition (a) to achieve condition(b) the cloth now attempts to accelerate the rollers against theexternal drive and thus there is a reversal of forces acting in theexternal drive. The reversal of forces becomes apparent in condition (a)and is the basis upon which the indication of practical zero raisecondition is founded.

Machines have been proposed and used in which it is possible to locatethe practical zero raising condition and these machines have also beenused to measure the amount of raising or felting action applied. It has,however, been appreciated that a true practical zero raise conditioncould not be achieved due to the existence of friction of the variousmoving parts associated with the drive to the card rollers.

The known machines have been operaed by initially synchronizing thespeed of the fabric and pile rollers as accurately as possible at thepoint of reversal of forces in the rollers by varying the speed oftravel of these elements. When synchronism is thus achieved the socalled point of practical zero raise can be indicated visually, audiblyor by other discernible means. It has then been the practice tosynchronize the speed of the counterpile rollers with the pile rollersand to work by speed indication from the datum point determined by speedvariation. Alternatively the speed of the cloth and the speed of thecounterpile rollers may be independently synchronized and indicated.

Contrary to previous opinions after the point of practical Zero raisinghas been located and synchronization of the elements has been achievedthe important factor controlling the raising effect is not speed but theapplied power required to cause the card wire points to act on thefibers to be raised.

It will be appreciated that in known raising machines the effect offriction and inertia in the moving parts is disadvantageous from thepoint of view of controlling and/ or ascertaining the actual forceapplied, and thus the work done, at the card wire points.

It is the object of the present invention to provide a raising machinein which it is possible to ascertain the actual conditions applying atthe point of contact of the card wire points and the cloth thereby tomake it possible to measure, control and record the power required tocause raising action.

In order to carry the invention into effect there is provided means in araising machine to compensate for and to measure the forces which tendto prevent the rollers from rotating freely when in contact with thecloth, said means including at least one driving element, the outputside of which is adapted to transmit drive to a gear wheel :lrivinglyengaging, through for example, belt drive means, the series of cardclothing covered rollers of the machine, :he arrangement being such thatthe torque character- .stics of the drive may be varied firstly tobalance out fric- :ional and other forces resisting movement of the saidgear vheel and rollers to allow the latter to synchronize with the speedof cloth passing over the raising machine and :hereafter to be varied tocause raising or felting to be ichieved, the amount of torque variationbeing measurable indicate the amount of raising or felting force beingtpplied to the cloth.

Preferably the driving element is a constant speed A.C. notor operablyassociated with an eddy current coupling.

In one aspect of the invention the counterpile roller gear Wheel isdriven by a constant speed motor and an eddy :urrent coupling, therebeing preferably a reduction gear, nterposed between these elements andthe gear Wheel.

In a further aspect of the invention the gear wheel tdapted to drive thepile rollers is driven by a constant peed motor, an eddy currentcoupling and a dynamic :oupling, one element of the latter beinganchored, means icing provided for rendering inoperative the eddycurrent :oupling or dynamic coupling dependent upon the condiionsrequired at the points of the card clothing.

The invention will be described further, by way of :xample, withreference to the accompanying drawings in which is illustrated one formof double acting raising machine, but this does not limit the use of theinvention to this type of machine alone.

In the drawings:

FIG. 1 is a diagrammatic representation of part of a double actingraising machine, parts being omitted for clarity.

FIG. 2 is a diagrammatic illustration of some of the rollers of themachine of FIG. 1, showing their direction of rotation, the direction ofmovement of the cloth and of the discs upon which the rollers aremounted, and,

FIG. 3 is a block circuit diagram.

In the following description only those parts of a raising machinerelevant to the invention will be referred to since raising machines perse are known.

A double acting raising machine includes a series of, for example,thirty six rollers, there being eighteen pile rollers 10 and eighteencounterpile rollers 12. The pile and counterpile rollers 10 .and 12 aremounted in bearings alternately between large spaced apart metal discs13 to form the periphery of a cylinder.

The eighteen pile rollers 10 are each provided with a drive pulley 11aadjacent one disc 13 and the counterpile rollers 12 are provided withdrive pulleys 11b adjacent the other disc 13.

Adjacent to and outside the discs 13 relative to the rollers 10 and 12are a pair of large gear wheels 14 and 15 each of which carry spacedapart brackets 16 overlying the periphery of a respective disc 13. Thebrackets carry belts (not shown) which contact the pile and counterpileroller pulleys 11a and 11b. The discs 13 and gear wheels 14 and 15 aremounted on a common axle 17 with and about which they rotate, the discs13 being driven by power applied to the axle 17 and the gear wheels 14and 15 being mounted for independent rotation on the axle 17. The axle17 is driven from a motor 18; if necessary through reduction gearing 19,so that any required speed of rotation of the axle 17 can be obtained.

As can be seen in FIG. 2, the pile rollers 10 rotate in the samedirection as the counterpile rollers 12 as indicated by the arrows A.The cloth moves over the rollers 10 and 12 in a direction opposite totheir direction of rotation, as shown by the arrow C and the discs 13rotate in a direction opposite to the rollers 10 and 12 as shown by thearrow D.

Enmeshed with the pile and counterpile gear wheels 14 and 15,respectively, are drive pinions 20 and 21.

The drive pinion 21 of the counterpile gear wheel 15 is driven by theoutput shaft 22 of an eddy current coupling 23 driven from a constantspeed A.C. motor 24. Any required reduction gear such as 25 could beincorporated between the drive pinion 21 and the eddy current coupling23.

The drive pinion 20 of the pile gear wheel 14 is mounted on a shaft 26which carries a chain sprocket 27. A chain 28 wraps the sprocket 27 anda sprocket 29 carried on a shaft 30. One end of the shaft 30 is coupledto a reduction gear such as 31 and the other end is connected to therotary member 32 of a dynamic coupling, the other member 33 of thecoupling being rigidly anchored against rotation. There is provided aneddy current coupling 34 with which is associated a constant speed A.C.motor 35, this arrangement being similar to the coupling 23 and motor 24of the counterpile rollers 12.

Referring now to the counterpile rollers and their associated drivingmeans, the eddy current coupling 23 is in circuit with a rectifier 36, apre-set resistance bank 37 and a solenoid operated change over switch38. One pole of switch 38 is connected to a pre-set variable transformer39 (the purpose of the variable transformer 39 is to provide momentaryenergy to overcome the inertia of the counterpile side of the machinewhen starting from rest). The variable transformer 39 is itself incircuit with three further variable transformers 40, 41 and 42 beingrespectively the felting, true practical zero and counterpile raisevariable transformer. The variable transformers 40, 41 and 42 areconnected each to one pole of a three pole selector switch 43 which isconnected to the other pole of switch 38.

In the case of the pile rollers the eddy current coupling 34 is incircuit with a resistance bank 44, a rectifier 45 and a three poleswitch 46. One pole is connected to a pile felting variable transformer47 and a second to a. zero raise variable transformer 48. The third poleis also connected to the zero raise variable transformer 48 so thatwhatever position the switch 46 is set at the pile roller eddy currentcoupling 34 is always energised. Shunted across the resistance bank 44is a solenoid operated switch 49 (hereinafter referred to).

Switches 43 and 46 are ganged together with a three pole switch 50 whichlatter is in circuit with a resistance bank 51, a rectifier 52 and theenergising coil 53 surrounding the rotary part 32 of the dynamiccoupling. Two poles of the switch 50 are open and the third is connectedto a pile raise variable transformer 54.

A switch 55 is provided to isolate the variable transformers 39, 40, 41,42, 47, 48 and 54. This switch is ganged with a switch (not shown)controlling the solenoid coil of the starter for the main motor 18. Anoverride two pole two way push button switch 56-56a is provided andarranged so that when the button is pressed the open circuit effect ofthe switch 55 is overriden so that the variable transformers 47, 48 and54 are in circuit (independent of the main motor 18) and the switch 56ais at the same time opened to isolate the variable transformers 39, 40,41 and 42.

An induction coil 57 is associated with one power feed line of the maindrive motor 18 and this is in circuit with an adjustable timer relay 58which is itself in circuit with the solenoids 38a and 49a of switches.38 and 49, respectively, which latter are shown in FIG. 3 in the runningposition hereinafter referred to. A meter 59 is provided to measure theapplied voltage to the winding 53 of the dynamic coupling 32, 33 and asimilar meter 60 is provided across the winding of the eddy currentcoupling 23. The meters 59 and 60 are provided with selector switches(not shown) by means of which they can be used either to indicatevoltage, as described above, or the output speed of the eddy currentcouplings 23 and 34.

In use, assuming the AC motors 24 and 35 are running and the switch 55is open, and that the selector switches 43, 46 and 50 are set so thatswitch 46 closes the circuit to variable transformer 48, the button 56is pressed, thereby to bring into circuit variable transformers 47, 48and 54, and to isolate variable transformers 39, 40, 41 and 42 (sincebutton 56a is opened).

As the main motor starting switch (not shown) is open, no current flowsto the motor 18, and in consequence, no electrical energy is inducedinto coil 57, and hence the timer relay 58 is not pulsed. Solenoidswitch 49 therefore remains open so that the full value of the pre-setresistance 44 is in circuit with variable transformer 48, switch 46,rectifier 45 and energising coil 34 of the pile eddy current coupling.

The pile zero variable transformer 48 is adjusted until the output shaftof the eddy current coupling 34 just starts to rotate, therebyindicating that frictional losses in the pile section of the machinehave been compensated for.

When button 56 is released, pile variable transformers 47, 48 and 54 areagain isolated and at the same time, as button 56a is also released,variable transformers 39, 40, 41 and 42 are brought back into circuit,although, since switch 55 is open none of the variable transformers areoperative.

The switch controlling the main motor 18 is now closed, and hence,switch 55, which is ganged with it, is also closed. The timer relay 58is so arranged that when current commences to flow to the main drivemotor 18 the relay is pulsed to close solenoid operated switch 49 (togive a starting condition in which the resistance 44 is short circuitedand thus the voltage to the energising coil 34 is at a maximum to applymomentarily the energy required to start the mechanism) and after apre-determined time, to re-open this switch (to give a runningcondition). Similarly to give a starting condition as the timer relay ispulse, the solenoid operated change over switch 38 is actuated so that,firstly variable transformer 39 is brought into circuit with the pre-setresistance bank 37, rectifier 36 and energising coil 23 of thecounterpile eddy current coupling. The transformer 39, is set to give aninitial power output sufiicient to overcome inertia of the machine partsand thus enable the machine to be started. After said predeterminedtime, switch 38 is changed to the running setting, disconnectingvariable transformer 39 and connecting, through selector switch 43,variable transformers 40, 41 or 42, as desired.

Since the machine has been set, in so far as the pile rollers areconcerned to counteract the frictional resistance in the pile side ofthe machine, the rollers will be rotating under the cloth at the truepractical zero condition. The speed of the rollers will be indicated onthe meter 59 when this is switched to indicate speed reading. Thecounterpile rollers are now adjusted so that their speed is the same asthat of the pile rollers, by adjustment of the variable transformer 41.This speed is indicated by the meter 60, which has been switched toindicate speed.

To cause raising action the switches 43, 46 and 50 are moved to theirright hand contact positions in which 46 is still in circuit with thepile Zero variable transformer 48, the switches 50 and 43 beingrespectively positioned to bring into circuit the variable transformers54 and 42. To vary the raising action of either pile or counterpilerollers, or both, the variable transformers 54 and 42 are adjusted tovary the voltage applied to the energising coil 53 of the dynamiccoupling 32, 33 and the eddy current coupling 23, this change will beindicated by the meters 59 and 60 either in terms of speed or in termsof voltage difference. Transformer 54 serves to bring the braking effecton pile rollers into operation through the dynamic coupling 32, 33. Itwill be appreciated that only two transformers are required for the pilerollers since transformer 41 in the counter pile side of the machineprovides the datum which need not be repeated since return to this bymovement of switch 43 automatically controls the pile side of themachine through switches 46 and 50 by deenergizing transformer 54 andmaintaining transformer 48 in circuit.

To cause felting the switches 43, 46 and 50 are switched to their lefthand contacts to bring the variable transformers 40 and 47 into circuitand by adjustment of these the degree of the felting effect can bevaried and again indicated by the meters 59 and 60 but in this case onlyin terms of speed. The transformer 47 is desirable because transformer48 is pre-set to the zero raise condition and thus when felting (ornegative raising as defined in column 2 at paragraph (0)) is required itis only necessary to raise the speed of rotation of the rollers to causethem to brush the cloth with the back of the card points. This conditioncould in fact be achieved without transformer 47 by increasing speedusing transformer 48 but then the preset condition of the transformerwould be altered and the machine would no longer be automaticallyresetting by mere movement of a switch. By using transformer 47therefore, the switch 46 can be moved without disturbing the setting of48 and thus any speed increase achieved by virtue of alteration oftransformer 47 will not disturb the pre-set zero datum. When raising isrequired the switch is re-set to bring the rollers back to zero speedand then the braking effect is obtained by variation of transformer 54.

It should be appreciated that it is always possible to vary the action(raising or felting) of the rollers and also to adjust the switches 43,46 and 50 to select at will any of the three conditions. The variabletransformer 54 and associated elements 50, 51, 52, and 53, enable thebraking effect of the dynamic coupling to be varied. As may be seen fromthe description at column 2, paragraph (b) raising is achieved bybraking the rollers and thus transformer 54 is used to vary the voltageoutput and thus vary the magnetic field strength about the energisingcoil 53 and thus apply a braking torque to the rotatable part 32 of thecoupling relative to the fixed part 33. Two of the poles of switch 50are unused so that the transformer 54 and the elements 50, 51, 52 and 53are not in circuit when zero raising or felting actions take place(these latter being controlled by transformers 47 and 48).

The invention is not restricted to the above details. For example, thecontrols described above could be replaced by other means of varying theelectrical power applied.

What is claimed is:

1. A raising machine for cloth comprising a cylinder, a series of cardclothing covered rollers disposed around the periphery of said cylinder,a gear wheel drivingly engaging said series of rollers, at least oneconstant speed motor, a magnetic coupling operatively interposed betweensaid motor and said gear wheel, at least two variable transformers foralternatively controlling the power supplied to said coupling so as tocontrol the torque transmission characteristics of said coupling, one ofsaid transformers being adjustable so that the torque transmitted bysaid coupling establishes a zero raise condition with respect to thecloth passing over the machine, and another of said transformers beingadjustable so that the torque transmitted by said coupling causes araising action to be achieved, and means for measuring the amount oftorque variation to indicate the amount of raising force being appliedto the cloth.

2. A raising machine as defined in claim 1 wherein said rollers includea series of pile rollers and a series of counterpile rollers, a gearwheel drivingly engaging each series of rollers, a constant speed motorassociated with each gear wheel, a magnetic coupling operativelyinterposed between each motor and its respective gear wheel, and atleast two variable transformers for alternatively controlling the powersupplied to each coupling.

3. A raising machine as defined in claim 2 wherein said measuring meansincludes a pair of meters, one of said meters measuring the powersupplied to the coupling associated with the pile rollers, and the othermeasuring the power supplied to the coupling associated with thecounterpile rollers.

4. A raising machine as defined in claim 2 including a power source, acircuit including said power source and said transformers, an isolatorswitch in said circuit for disconnecting said transformers from saidpower source, and switch means in said circuit for connecting 5 onlysaid transformers associated with the pile rollers to said power sourcewhen said isolator switch is open, to allow said one of saidtransformers to be adjusted ta establish a zero raise condition withrespect to the cloth passing over the pile rollers.

5. A raising machine as defined in claim 2 including a power source, amain motor for the machine, a resistance between said power source andsaid coupling associated with the pile rollers, and means responsive tostarting of said main motor for momentarily short circuiting saidresistance, whereby increased power is furnished to said pile couplingfor overcoming the inertia of the pile rollers upon starting of themachine.

6. A raising machine as defined in claim 2 including a power source, amain motor for the machine, an additional variable transformer betweensaid power source and said coupling associated with the counterpilerollers, and means responsive to starting of said main motor formomentarily connecting said counterpile coupling to said power sourcevia said additional transformer, whereby said additional transformer maybe adjusted to transit a surge of power to said counterpile coupling forovercoming the inertia of the counterpile rollers upon starting of themachine.

7. A raising machine as defined in claim 6 wherein said responsive meansincludes a solenoid operated switch for controlling the connection ofsaid counterpile coupling to said additional transformer, a timer relayfor controlling the energization of said solenoid switch, and aninduction coil responsive to energization of said main motor forinitiating the operation of said timer relay.

8. A raising machine as defined in claim 1 including a dynamic couplinghaving rotary and stationary elements, said rotary element being indriven relationship to said magnetic coupling, and said stationaryelement being fixed with respect to the machine frame, whereby saiddynamic coupling has a braking effect on the transmission of torque bysaid magnetic coupling thereby causing a raising action, and means forvarying the power supplied to said dynamic coupling to vary said brakingeffect.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,857,649 10/ 1958 Scholaert26-34 XR 2,989,795 6/1961 Pilkington et a1. 2634 3,026,596 3/1962Kuppers et al 2635 FOREIGN PATENTS 696,437 9/ 1953 Great Britain.

749,896 6/ 1956 Great Britain.

821,850 10/1959 Great Britain.

880,018 10/1961 Great Britain.

632,635 1/1962 Italy. 1,063,111 8/1959 Germany.

ROBERT R. MACKEY, Primary Examiner.

